


What Defines Love?

by Steggy



Category: Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Essay, F/M, Kinda, it was for vocab, oh well, winter soldier spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-19
Updated: 2014-04-19
Packaged: 2018-01-19 22:34:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1486582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Steggy/pseuds/Steggy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just an essay written for English about Steve & Peggy's relationship.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Defines Love?

In the great story of Captain America, there were many who led the man behind the shield, Steve Rogers, to the position he holds now. Peggy Carter, his training officer at first, was a buttress for Steve, giving him someone to rely and fall back on and that would always support him no matter what. Steve had a great deference for Peggy, but the moment that she punched one of the other recruits of his unit in the nose for disrespecting her, he swooned. Yet, he was never really able of reading between the lines. Peggy kept her feelings for Steve, that easily mirrored his for her, as surreptitious as possible, even though the look in her eye gave it away. Though, in the end, they came together on the same page for the first time. The gist of their relationship can be paraphrased in just one quote, “I’m gonna need a raincheck on that dance.”

    Reaching the end of his mission, Steve had come face to face with a hard choice. His enemy defeated, he was now left with a broken plane carrying nuclear bombs that was headed for New York City. There was only one option: to bring the plane, and himself, down. Yet, there were ones that he loved back home, like Peggy. So, picking up the console radio, he paged in back to base, where his girl sat and awaited to hear that he was okay. The tone of his voice induced an almost clangor in her ear, a warning bell to Peggy, when it reached through to her, and a feeling of presentiment washed over her. And the moment that Steve said there wasn’t going to be a safe landing of the plane for him to come home, it was obvious that all outcomes were going to be inauspicious. She urged him to find another way, but it was his choice, and his choice alone. The path back to Peggy was tortuous and one he couldn’t dare to take when lives were at risk, even as much as Steve wanted to. Peggy knew that what Steve was about to was more than likely deleterious to himself, but even then, she couldn’t bear to say goodbye. Neither could Steve. Even when the plane was headed towards the water, Steve handled it with equanimity for the sake of his best girl on the other end of the radio. He cajoled her by promising a raincheck on a dance that she had before asked him out for. For the first time in her life, however, Peggy was vulnerable to her rising emotions, and at these words, tears fell from her eyes. It was contingent that it was their last time together, but still, they made plans for a future date, unable to say goodbye. And shortly after their date was set, the radio cut out, and Peggy was left alone, knowing that on the other side, Steve was too, slipping into the ice and freezing.

    All of the moments Peggy and Steve had had together, especially in that moment, seemed evanescent, but would always stay with them. Following Steve’s disappearance and being the last one to have talked to him, she was to be the bearer of bad news. Peggy was brusque when telling of the event, her own emotions concealed behind a thick wall, trying to remain as impassive as possible. She allowed herself to act slovenly for a few days to allow herself to grieve over his assumed death, but only when she was alone, living in tissues upon tissues. Otherwise, Peggy remitted her feelings about it all, in the end, never properly handling them. Nothing, not even work, could have satiated the hole that had appeared in her heart. But more than anything, she was proud of him. Steve went from a scrawny boy from Brooklyn to a hero. He had thwarted an evil man’s plan to take over the world, even though at the cost of losing his one true love. A true hero.

    Yet, his death was not a death at all. Seventy years later, they found Steve frozen, and they expected him to appear cadaverous, not expecting much more than a frozen corpse. However, aside from a slight blue tint, there was a pulse, which meant that there was a beating heart beneath the cold. Defrosted, Steve was brought into the modern world, forced to cope with things on his own, without his one best supporter, Peggy, at his side, or any of his friends that he had made in the 40’s. Because of that, Steve prates, now, endlessly about missing his date with her, even though, once he finds out she’s still kicking at 96, he visits her in her nursing home. He goes on and on about not being able to leave his best girl, still holding her to the promise of a dance some way or another. And he continues to visit her, even if every so often, her memory fails her, and he’s forced to put on a smile, mask the pain, and push through her heartbreaking words of how she’s missed him, how long it’s been, and how he’s come back. Because that’s what love is, being there for each other until the end of the line. 


End file.
